First of all, I would like to state as a matter of record that the prophet Brigham Young did not believe in the so-called Adam-God theory that has been attributed to him. He has made numerous statements to the contrary and I will just quote one of them here:

"Some say, "We are the children of Adam and Eve." So we are, and they are the children of our Heavenly Father. We are all the children of Adam and Eve, and they and we are the offspring of Him who dwells in the heavens, the highest Intelligence that dwells anywhere that we have any knowledge of." (John Dehlin 13:311. See alsoJD 1:238, 10:231, and 13:309.)

I believe that the great confusion that came about over this matter was basically for two reasons. The first, and main reason, was due to the manner of speech by Brigham Young. Brigham Young would sometimes refer to Heavenly Father as "Adam," and the Heavenly mother of Adam, or Michael, as "Eve," according to Elden Watson who was the compiler of the "Manuscript Addressesof Brigham Young, 1801-1877" (six volumes). This fact alone accounts for about 98% of this great misunderstanding. The other 2% maay be explained by the discrepancies between Wilford Woodruff's notes, written in longhand, and the stenographers report which did not include some of Woodruff's notes. Elden Watson observed that Brigham Young may have been inadequately recorded. One may then ask the obvious question; if there were two "Adams," then why didn't Brigham Young just say so instead of having his talks so confusing? The answer to that is that on many occasions he did distinguish, or at least attempted to. Perhaps, he could have stated Adam, Sr. and Adam, Jr., but these were legal terms in those days which were frequesntly used in writing, but very seldom used when speaking, and probably would have been considered as irreverent anyhow. One should also keep in mind that the name "Adam" is a title which means "first man," and one should also consider that as Seth was the son of Adam (or first man), Adam was the son of God who could also be considered as the real first man, or "Adam," since He was the Father of Adam! I refer you to Luke 3:38, Moses 6:22, and the following statement by Brigham Young which accurately describes his beliefs concerning the matter!

"Things were first created spiritually; the Father actually begat the spirits,and then He commenced the work of creating earthly tabernacles, precisely as He had been created in the flesh Himself, by partaking of the coarse material that was organized and composed this earth, until HIs system was charged with it, consequently, the tabernacles of His children were organized from the coarse materials {or dust} of this earth." ("The Discourses of Brigham Young," page 50)

Now, in the light of all of the above, let's examine the controversial statement made by Brigham Young on April 9, 1852, with my comments in brackets:

"When our Father Adam {Heavenly Father} came into the garden of Eden, He came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve {Adam, or MIchael's Heavenly Mother}, one of His wives with Him. {Now there is a possible ommision as previously mentioned.} He {Adam, or Michael} helped to make and organize this world. He is Michael, the archangel, the Ancient of Days, about whom holy men have written and spoken - he is our father and our god {the god who is over all this earth under Christ - see Daniel, chapter 7, where he reigns until Christ comes with the clouds of heaven to reign on earth personally!}, and the only god with whom we have to do" {meaning that Adam will reign over our earth as our god and our prince under Christ, who will reign over many worlds , including ours, under HIs Heavenly Father. However, it should be remembered that we all have the potential to progress and become like our Heavenly Father.}.

The rest of this statement by Brigham Young is self explanatory so I will not include it all here. Instead, let's examine another controversial statement made by Brigham Young on August 28, 1852 in this same light:

"After men have got their exaltations and their crowns - have become Kings of kings and Lords of lords, they have the power then of propagating their species in spirit, and that is the first of their operations with regard to organizing a world. Power is given to them to organize the elements, and then commence the organixation of tabernacles. How can they do it? Have they to go to that earth? Yes, and Adam {a Heavenly Father, and this meaning should be more obvious to the critics since the prophet is referring to others who will later receive their exaltations!!!} will have to go there, and he cannot do it without Eve {a Heavenly Mother}; He must have Eve to commence the work of gereration, and they will go into the garden, and continue to eat and drink the fruits of the coporeal world, until this gross matter is diffused sufficiently through their celestial bodies to enable them, according to established laws, to produce mortal {actually, terrestial bodies that will eventually become mortal, like Adam's, or Michael's} tabernacles for their spirit children."

The rest of this statement is self explanatory and I will not include it here. In conclusion, I will simply state that when these controversial statements by the prophet Brigham Young are examined carefully with proper consideration to his manner of speech, it is apparent that they are consistent with his other quotes which I mentioned in this writing. Also, it is not reasonable that Brigham Young would contradict himself to the great degree that his critics have asserted. The explaination which I have presented is by far more reasonable as well as more consistent with all of his other statements and teachings.

Joined: Fri Mar 09, 2012 6:08 pmPosts: 2310Location: We Have Always Been At War with Eastasia

Mormon theology is like an Etch a Sketch.

_________________"And the human knew the source of life, the woman of him, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, 'I have procreated a man with Yahweh.'" Gen. 4:1, interior quote translated by D. Bokovoy.

Poor Brigham, God only knows how many times that bus will run him over.

BY taught Adam God.That BY was not consistent in how he referred to God does not mean he didn't teach Adam God it just means he was not consistent. (If lack of consistency is going to be an argument then you will either have to throw out the D&C description of the nature of God or the one in the Book of Mormon.)BY went even so far as to incorporate his Adam God doctrine in the Saint George temple lecture at the veil which was later removed by Joseph F. Smith in 1904 or 05.If he didn't teach it then please explain the following.

Quote:

In late 1890, 1891, 1892, Bishop Edward Bunker Jr. and his father, Edward Bunker Sr. of Bunkerville, Utah, and his counselor Myron Abbot were before church courts. The Bunkers denied Adam-God doctrine; Abbott accepted it. The final High Council Court was held June 11, 1892, and was attended by President Wilford Woodruff and his first counselor, George Q. Cannon. In summary, the Bunkers had their hands slapped for advancing false doctrine and “indulging in mysteries.” Bunker Sr. was advised “to let these things alone.” Abbott, who supported Adam-God doctrine, was cautioned to not become “puffed up in pride” over the victory. See Adam-God Maze, pp. 215-238 for the sources covering the above. Also Unpublished Revelations, pp. 168-175.

or why Brigham had to almost oust Orson Pratt from the Quorum of the 12 for taking issue with BY's teaching on Adam-God?

There are a lot of threads you can research here on this. Most of Watson's paper has been refuted, even he admits at the end of his paper that BY never made a statement about two Adams.

By taught Adam-God, he was just wrong.

_________________"Joseph's book is a great deal more useful to a student of the intellectual preoccupations and the folkways of New York State in the third decade of the nineteenth century than to a scholar who would reconstruct the pre-Columbian history of America."Dale Morgan

Anyone who disputed it and was reprimanded, or whatever, etc., simply did not understand what he meant. It is obvious to me what he meant since he also referred to future Adam's and Eve's who would be exalted, and then go into a new world and do just what Heavenly Father did in this one. The compiler of all of his discourses who was very familiar with his discourses as well as his manner of speech was also of the same opinion as me. Brigham Young also stated clearly what he meant many other times, and some of them I quoted in this writing.

Brigham Young said Adam was God.Brigham Young also said Adam wasn't God.

He seems kind of confused for a man with direct daily access to our creator...

_________________“We look to not only the spiritual but also the temporal, and we believe that a person who is impoverished temporally cannot blossom spiritually.”Keith McMullin - Counsellor in Presiding Bishopric

The prophet Brigham Young, no matter who thought what, did not believe that Adam was God. Perhaps some of the people who had a problem with his statements had reading comprehension problems with them. His critics often quote the August 28, 1852 statement in order to prove that he did believe that Adam was God, however, in that very statement itself he clearly is talking about people who will later receive their exaltations and refers to them as Adam and Eve!!!

I am not allowed to discuss this in any detail, however, I hope that there are not many here who place their faith in the accuracy of the temple films, etc., because some of them are absolutely inaccurate, and I have discussed this matter inside the temple with a temple president who didn't understand why, just as I didn't.

Dream on BC. BY Taught Adam was God. It was in the endowment, it was understood as such by those who heard it. Your constant crow of victory is another example of how disingenuous you are.

I will offer you this challenge again and it is about the 6th time. Find me one contemporary of Young that understood his AG teaching as Adam SR/JR. Till you can do so shut up about it.

Such angst when you should be inhaling the Celestial airs instead.

Nutall proved you wrong on the former. That Adam-God is in conflict with the BY quotes I gave and the several critical doctrines it contradicts (and were never overturned or repealed during BY's tenure) is logic enough to crack this old chestnut. All the denial you can muster and bluster cannot prevent me from savoring the results actual scholarship.

Dream on BC. BY Taught Adam was God. It was in the endowment, it was understood as such by those who heard it. Your constant crow of victory is another example of how disingenuous you are.

I will offer you this challenge again and it is about the 6th time. Find me one contemporary of Young that understood his AG teaching as Adam SR/JR. Till you can do so shut up about it.

Such angst when you should be inhaling the Celestial airs instead.

Nutall proved you wrong on the former. That Adam-God is in conflict with the BY quotes I gave and the several critical doctrines it contradicts (and were never overturned or repealed during BY's tenure) is logic enough to crack this old chestnut. All the denial you can muster and bluster cannot prevent me from savoring the results actual scholarship.

Don't worry, BC. It can not be any more obvious what Brigham Young meant than his very own August 28th statement in 1852! His critics say that statement shows that he believed in the Adam-God theory, but even a casual reading of that shows clearly that he was referring to some future "Adam" and "Eve" as future heavenly parents! This is the same thing He meant in the other statement I quoted that he used when referring to Heavenly Father, and it is consistent with all of the other statements he made concerning the same topic such as the second quote that I gave! Some people are just too proud to ever admit that they are wrong! They are just always in the attack mode, and they love to be on this site so they can fulfill their desire to attack! "Ye have eyes, but ye do not see." Ye have ears, but ye do not hear."

BC, is it just me, or can other people get the same meaning that I do when I read the statement of Brigham Young of August 28,1852 that so many critics have condemned him for? To me, Brigham Young is clearly speaking of future "Adam's" and "Eve's" that will go to some future world and eat and drink of the fruits of the "garden" there to produce physical tabernacles for the first parents of that world!

BC, is it just me, or can other people get the same meaning that I do when I read the statement of Brigham Young of August 28,1852 that so many critics have condemned him for? To me, Brigham Young is clearly speaking of future "Adam's" and "Eve's" that will go to some future world and eat and drink of the fruits of the "garden" there to produce physical tabernacles for the first parents of that world!

You mean like they become Gods themselves and have their own planet?

_________________“We look to not only the spiritual but also the temporal, and we believe that a person who is impoverished temporally cannot blossom spiritually.”Keith McMullin - Counsellor in Presiding Bishopric

Brigham Young was inconsistent on this topic as well as on others. Most people who do a lot of public speaking are. I think that Elder Bruce R. McConkie got it right in his 2/19/81 letter to Eugene England:

"Yes, President Young did teach that Adam was the father of our spirits, and all the related things that the cultists ascribe to him. This, however, is not true. He expressed views that are out of harmony with the gospel. But, be it known, Brigham Young also taught accurately and correctly, the status and position of Adam in the eternal scheme of things. What I am saying is that Brigham Young, contradicted Brigham Young, and the issue becomes one of which Brigham Young we will believe."

The original post was interesting. But its biggest weakness is probably its very originality. Most of BY's contemporaries apparently believed he was teaching the Adam-God Theory in the form in which it is popularly understood -- i.e., giving the words their plain meanings, and not trying to force them into a complicated explanatory matrix.

This popular understanding is also shared by many fundamentalists (Elder McConkie's "cultists") of our own day. How is it that all of these people have maintained the theory in an incorrect form?

Yes, this so-called theory has caused much confusion, even within the church! However, no matter who misunderstood Brigham Young, the fact remains that he was definitely misunderstood! You have to either believe that, or believe that he was so mixed up that he would teach one thing one day, and the next day teach another! However, as I stated before, his critics use the latter quote I referred to to try and prove their point, and their logic is greatly flawed in this because in this very same quote it is very obvious that he is referring to future exalted "Adam's" and "Eve's" who will produce physical tabernacles for the future worlds just as Heavenly Father did with "one of His wives" whom Brigham Young also refers to as (an) "Adam"!

Sometimes Brigham Young wouldn't even wait one day to contradict himself, as was pointed out in Christofferson's conference talk this weekend, BY got up in morning conference during the approach of Johnston's army and preached one course of action for the saints against the invading army, then in the afternoon session asked the saints to forget about what he had said in the morning.

Much of his disagreement with Orson Pratt was because Orson Pratt was trying to make sense of BY's conflicting teachings.

Orson Pratt writes:

Quote:

"Neither can I persuade myself even now" he wrote, " that minds accustomed to severe thought and meditation as yours have been these many years, can, after due reflection,and reading the vast number of revelations which seem most clearly to teach differently, still believe in a doctrine which appears to be so contrary to what is revealed ."

_________________"Joseph's book is a great deal more useful to a student of the intellectual preoccupations and the folkways of New York State in the third decade of the nineteenth century than to a scholar who would reconstruct the pre-Columbian history of America."Dale Morgan